"Cloning" a Puppy install to a larger USB drive

[grepnoke]

I have a frugal install that I have customised extensively. The USB drive is now full (with files in the main file system, not squashed into save file) and I want to move to a bigger drive keeping all the apps and customisation that I have.

My guess is that I should boot off the existing drive, do an install to the new one, and then copy some files* from old to new, overwriting or renaming the ones created in the install. I don't imagine any files in Puppy depend on the partition size but that could be a problem if so.

*"Some files" being the PupSave and all .sfs files, and I guess initrd.gz. Anything else? The new grub config should be fine for me, I don't think I changed any defaults. Vmlinuz I imagine never changes.

As the drive is bigger I will increase the PupSave file if that's easy. I think I'll do that once the new drive is installed and booting OK, that looks the simplest and safest way.

Sorry if this has been asked before, a common question no doubt but I couldn't find anything related. I'd appreciate advice on whether I can/should do this and all the files I'd need to copy. I seem to recall I've done this from a failing drive, but only to a drive and partition of the same size.

[bigpup]

In a frugal install the main Puppy sfs files are read only.
They do not change.
The save is read/write and has any alterations made to anything that is in the main SFS files.
All setting changes, added programs, etc... are in the save only.

Usually all you need to do is make a new frugal install of Puppy to the new USB.
Use the original Puppy iso to do the install.
Copy the old save to it.
That is now just like the old frugal install.

with files in the main file system, not squashed into save file.

So, you have stuff stored outside of the save?
Explain?????



If you are using a save file not a save folder.
The format of the USB partition affects max save file size limit.
fat32 format max save file size is 4GB.
ntfs, ext 2, 3, or 4, formats have no size limit the save file can be.
A save file on these formats can be resized higher than 4GB.

If the partition is formatted ext 2, 3, or 4.
A save folder can be used. It auto adjusts size of folder.
Size is limited by amount of free space in the partition.

You can change a save file to a save folder.

First, the save folder has to be placed in a location that is formatted in a Linux format.

savefile2dir 1.6 - Convert savefile to savefolder
This is the forum topic:
http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=96472
The savefile2dir-1.6.pet is here:
http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic. ... 673#855673

[grepnoke]

Thanks bigpup, sounds straightforward with no nasty gotchas.

Explain? Well, I was new to Puppy and didn't want to save things that I might not be able to recover if the drive stopped booting. I've since learned that sfs and 2fs are compression formats that can be extracted with widely available tools from another Puppy or Linux boot.

That's the why. Did you mean how? I've been having a look and I'm baffled to know how I did it. I thought it was a boot parameter but I can't find where they are saved. Or in bootloader config but extlinux.conf looks normal. Or even /etc/fstab but that is unchanged too.

All I know is that my /mnt/home is mounted at the root of the physical partition, i.e. the dir that contains vmlinuz etc. Or maybe a folder underneath.

I'll need to clone the drive and see if that behaviour gets copied across. If not I'll have to do some serious digging.

The fs is ext4 so I could create a save folder as you suggest. I may do that but a bigger save file would be fine, as I only write to it when I've changed or installed something. Saving to PupSave is disabled on shutdown to save drive life.

[nic007]

Thanks bigpup, sounds straightforward with no nasty gotchas.

Explain? Well, I was new to Puppy and didn't want to save things that I might not be able to recover if the drive stopped booting. I've since learned that sfs and 2fs are compression formats that can be extracted with widely available tools from another Puppy or Linux boot.

That's the why. Did you mean how? I've been having a look and I'm baffled to know how I did it. I thought it was a boot parameter but I can't find where they are saved. Or in bootloader config but extlinux.conf looks normal. Or even /etc/fstab but that is unchanged too.

All I know is that my /mnt/home is mounted at the root of the physical partition, i.e. the dir that contains vmlinuz etc. Or maybe a folder underneath.

I'll need to clone the drive and see if that behaviour gets copied across. If not I'll have to do some serious digging.

The fs is ext4 so I could create a save folder as you suggest. I may do that but a bigger save file would be fine, as I only write to it when I've changed or installed something. Saving to PupSave is disabled on shutdown to save drive life.

.2fs is not a compression format but a filesystem. Savefiles have the .2fs, .3fs, .4fs extension and the contents are not compressed. We still need to know how you saved your changes if it was a frugal install indeed. My guess is that if you did in fact make a frugal install your savings are now in a savefolder in the partition where your other Pupy files are located or you have at some time saved it to an sfs file (unlikely).

[dogFellow]

https://easyos.org/forum/showthread.php?tid=94

[grepnoke]

Thanks all for comments

Re home on the physical filesystem: I searched for boot parameters without success. I was sure I had PHOME= set in a Grub config, but that must have been an older version or different distro. No reference in any file to anything that would have done it.

Then by chance I noticed that /mnt/home was a symlink to /initrd/mnt/dev-save !

Is that naughty? I can at least confirm it works. Anything copied to /mnt/home persists without needing a save at shutdown (which I have disabled) or at any other time.

dogFellow, I think using dd to clone a drive is dodgy. Okay, you can enlarge the partition later, but I've come unstuck doing a logical copy between Flash drives. Maybe sectors had been remapped, or whatever, it failed to boot. I know I used the word clone, but in quotes!

.2fs etc: I wrongly assumed it was compressed. I just meant any places where files might be stored.

[cobaka]

Hello @grepnoke

Recently MikeSLR (or Mikeslr) posted several threads about installing Puppy Linux. Each thread described a different method of installation for 'the Puppy'.

In particular one method involved copying the base files (mvlinuz, drv files etc) to a folder using ROX. I wanted to know if his method, using ROX, worked. It worked (for the single version of Puppy I chose to install) and I suspect it will for every version of Puppy. Having done that, I returned to my faithful, working version of uPupBB32.

Briefly, Mike's method involves using gParted and the grub4dos bootloader and (after that) copying files. Here is the link:

viewtopic.php?p=1788#p1788

I don't know much about the role of the pupsave file, but I strongly recommend NOT leaving pup-save files 'lying' around your system, like autumn leaves in a park. Moreover I warn against having more than one Puppy OS on your computer at the same time. I know some do this - they must understand the system better than me. I got grief using a practice they use routinely.

Finally, I keep very little in my save-file. There is a posting (somewhere) about keeping a slim save-file. I just keep most of my 'work' on a separate drive (not a separate partition) from the OS files. This practice has many advantages, both with the Windows OS and Linux etc.

How I restore a working save file: I install Puppy, and boot the system. I create a save-file (when I power-off for the first time). I will replace the 'empty' save-file with my working file, by doing the following. I remember the name of the save file I just created. After that, I boot a 'fresh' Puppy ('fresh' = w/out a save file). I use the 'fresh' Puppy to replace the tiny save-file with my big 'fat' working save-file.

When I shut down my 'fresh' Puppy I do not create a save file. (There is one on the disk already). Exchange the 'fresh' thumb drive (Puppy) and my faithful 'working' thumb drive. I re-boot Puppy. I have my old system back, with the previous environment.

I have done this several times.

All the best, and good luck.

собака.

[bigpup]

Then by chance I noticed that /mnt/home was a symlink to /initrd/mnt/dev-save

/mnt/home is the top layer of the partition Puppy is installed on.
If Puppy is a frugal install on partition sda1.
/mnt/home is that partition sda1.

A frugal install is usually all the Puppy files and save file/folder placed inside a directory(folder) and that directory placed on a partition.
Anything placed in /mnt/home is outside of the Puppy frugal install.
/mnt/home shows you that partition showing what is on that partition.

To visually see what /mnt/home is.
Left click on the desktop drive icon for the drive Puppy is installed on.

/mnt/home was a symlink to /initrd/mnt/dev-save

That is because the /initrd/mnt/ uses dev-save as the name for /mnt/home

[grepnoke]

Thanks all for your advice.

Bigpup, all of this was because of your words

So, you have stuff stored outside of the save?
Explain?????

I assumed that this was something hard to do and searched for how I would have done it. You now tell me that this is how it always works, that your home dir is the same as the physical partition.

So your Explain????? was not because this is unusual or hard to do. It's impossible not to do! So what did you mean? Did you mean explain WHY - that this is an odd thing to want to do.

Glad for the explanation - just puzzled.

BTW I'm expecting the big USB stick any day and will report back here to confirm if it works as planned.

[bigpup]

If you are running a frugal installed Puppy that has been shutdown choosing to make a save.
When it boots up the save is being used to store any changes, added software, whatever is different.
To you everything done is seen as normal processes when doing whatever.
Think of the save being the normal data storage for the running Puppy.

To put something in /mnt/home you have to tell a program/process to do it.
placing whatever outside of the Puppy frugal install.
Example:
If using a browser to download something.
Select to download to /mnt/home
It will download to the partition Puppy is on, but not into Puppy.

To really mess with your head.
There is another home directory in Puppy.
/home/spot
It is the home directory for the browser restricted user spot.
If you run a browser as user spot.
You are restricted to any downloads from the internet go into /home only.

spot

This brings us to 'spot', which is a classical name for a dog. But, spot is not a normal user, you don't login as user spot. Instead, you bootup in the normal way as the root user, but you can choose to run some Internet applications as the restricted user spot.
This means that you have unfettered access to your local system, all the benefits of root, no hassles with file/directory ownerships and permissions, no restrictions on access to all hardware.
But, you can run, for example, SeaMonkey (browser, Composer, mail&news, IRC-chat suite), as spot. The home directory for spot is /home/spot, and SeaMonkey will only be able to (normally) edit/create/write files inside /home/spot.

With spot, you have the best of both worlds. Freedom in your local system, a restricted user for Internet access.

optionally running as spot -- you can choose your level of web-browsing danger, via the Login and Security Manager in the System menu.
A fork of Puppy, FatDog64, features all Internet applications running as spot.

[grepnoke]

Thanks bigpup!

Yes, that was how I intended. If a made a change like a new install or config I would run a save. Data I wanted to keep I would manually copy to a dir under /mnt/home. It kept my OS installation nice and clean and reduced most writes to Flash to new files I'd seldom need to change.

I didn't know about /home/spot. That's like a chroot jail, or maybe it is one. Good idea for browsing. I don't go online much with this Puppy, it's mainly for working on computers on a couple of sites to have everything I need and not touching any HDD install.

I must investigate FatDog64 but will do so on a separate install not the new one. And I'll report back on anything that might be of interest when I do my "clone".

[mikewalsh]

Guys, aren't we making this out to be harder than it really is..? (Don't take that the way it sounds; no criticism intended here..! )

In my experience, if the OP intends to use the exact same hardware again, I would prepare/format the new flash drive first, then I would simply copy the entire thing from the smaller USB to the bigger USB. It won't need re-configuring for different hardware (although the kernel is extremely good at 'discovering' the current hardware as it boots anyway), and all that would be needed would be to re-run Grub4DOS again, making sure to specify the correct flash drive...yes?

This has always worked for me.....and Puppy is one of the easiest Linux distros to do this with. It's a simple copy/paste operation.

Just my tuppence-worth..!


Mike.

[grepnoke]

Thanks Mike

I gave that a lot of thought. I'm sure it would have worked. But I decided to go with my original plan. Making the new USB bootable and set up the same (which has gone wrong for me in the past) is handled by the Puppy installer. Then saving away the new installation files and copying over the old ones was pretty quick. Plus that way I get to understand Puppy's workings better.

I copied everything in /mnt/home to /mnt/sdd1 (the new drive) except for
my data files
vmlinux (same on both)
ldlinux.sys (different but immutable)
and that has created an identical Puppy install with all my config. My save "file" was already a save dir so copied that as well.

Now I have an overnight data copy to do and I'll be all set.

PS Do you ever go the the car boot at Knight's Hill Mike? Was disappointing today.

Adrian

[mikewalsh]

Thanks Mike

I gave that a lot of thought. I'm sure it would have worked. But I decided to go with my original plan. Making the new USB bootable and set up the same (which has gone wrong for me in the past) is handled by the Puppy installer. Then saving away the new installation files and copying over the old ones was pretty quick. Plus that way I get to understand Puppy's workings better.

I copied everything in /mnt/home to /mnt/sdd1 (the new drive) except for
my data files
vmlinux (same on both)
ldlinux.sys (different but immutable)
and that has created an identical Puppy install with all my config. My save "file" was already a save dir so copied that as well.

Now I have an overnight data copy to do and I'll be all set.

PS Do you ever go the the car boot at Knight's Hill Mike? Was disappointing today.

Adrian

@grepnoke :-

Ah, well; the main thing is that it's working for you. You'll admit, I think, that this kind of thing is a whole lot easier to do with Puppy than just about anything else..!

As for Knight's Hill....sounds like you're fairly "local" to me..? Me, I don't care who knows where I live; it's somewhere down Nursery Lane in South Wootton, though I'm not getting more specific than that. 'Car boots' have never really been my thing, and with all this COVID crap going on - and cases on the rise again - I'm even less likely to go to such events.

As Mama's full-time carer - she's 86 with spinal arthritis, and I'm pushing 60 with heart "issues" - I've gotta be careful, y'know.....


Mike.

[grepnoke]

Ah, well; the main thing is that it's working for you. You'll admit, I think, that this kind of thing is a whole lot easier to do with Puppy than just about anything else..!

As for Knight's Hill....sounds like you're fairly "local" to me..? Me, I don't care who knows where I live; it's somewhere down Nursery Lane in South Wootton, though I'm not getting more specific than that. 'Car boots' have never really been my thing, and with all this COVID crap going on - and cases on the rise again - I'm even less likely to go to such events.

As Mama's full-time carer - she's 86 with spinal arthritis, and I'm pushing 60 with heart "issues" - I've gotta be careful, y'know.....

Yes, once you understand how Puppy works it's great. I'll reply to the rest privately.

[Clarity]

Replying quietly via PM does NOT help any PUP members should there be some additions found or a newer method/approach used for success or failures.

Please continue posting as this experiences may be useful information to others.

There are many cloning/backup/restore methods in Puppy Linux everywhere as well as differing experiences often shared on this topic.

Because there are many, there does NOT appear to be an "official" service even within a particular PUP.

I think this may be category that could be added to this forum so that the various efforts found, tested, and the experieces of members could be LISTED. This way, since these kind of things are reasonably common, the various methods that member have can be exposed. This category would/could include PUP generated or open-source or freebees listed in one location for user investigation and use.

Thoughts?

[grepnoke]

I didn't add anything more to the thread because I'd already described eaxctly what I did and the results. If anyone has any alternative ideas that would be useful.

What I put in the PM was a discussion of car boot sales (I don't know the names for these in other countries) in the King's Lynn area, and other chat about that part of England where Mike lives and I know well. I thought that was better OUT of this topic!

I agree it would be a good idea to have a permanent place for this topic - wiki maybe better than this forum. I'm not a Puppy expert but will be happy to add or expand my experiences with this.

[mikewalsh]

@Clarity :-

What went in the PM was purely personal 'chat', since we've discovered we live very close. I rather think, after knocking around forums/bulletin boards for over a quarter of a century, that I'm well aware of what benefits a community.....probably more than most. Personal stuff just serves to clutter up a thread.

I think what we really need is summat like a permanent, modern-looking, "how-to" community wiki. The old one is, in some respects, becoming somewhat irrelevant, since a lot of the subject links refer to very old threads, old ways of doing things, and even older hardware than I think anybody with any sense would WANT to use. A major overhaul might not be a bad thing, and in the process, perhaps, "streamline" it somewhat.

Just a thought, like. I'm not knocking DarkCity's efforts; he/she has done a marvellous job over the years, but the wiki really needs dragging, kicking & screaming, into the modern age alongside the new forum.

(Y'know, I don't know WHY, but you remind me very much of a former Puppian, used to go by the handle of "gcmartin". He could be a real pompous, self-righteous p**ck at times....and made quite a habit of demanding to know what everybody else was doing, AND why they were doing it, too. AND of taking it upon himself to castigate/name-and-shame anyone he didn't agree with. Seemed to think he was the forum policeman. )

Be advised that any other developments of a "technical" nature will of course continue to be aired in fora. That's the point of this place. We've already had one public slanging match between two other, long-standing members in recent days. I'd hate to think another 'barney' was on the way.....'cos I, for one, don't NEED it.


Mike.

[Clarity]

Hope no one thought I was knocking anyone here as it may have been noted that I showed happy when @grepnoke posted before the prior post by MikeWalsh. You are quite the chap here, Mike. But your timing is ill and whatever identity you are illuding is also ill. So please understand my first sentence in this post. And as for Grepnoke, I think he has seen my approval.

He was clear, although, we do need, I feel, a category in the forum that is dedicated to what is discussed on this cloning thread.

Thanks, though.

[grepnoke]

Well, let me stick to the topic!

Yes. I'm a beginner compared to most of you but I think this would be useful. AFAICS this relates to creating a copy of a frugal install on new media which may be of a different size. It may vary from one version to another but the files that seemed to be needed were
initrd.gz
*.sfs
Save file or directory

vmlinuz and probably any help etc *.msg files probably never change. ldlinux.sys was different but immutable, I don't know what the difference was but the new one that Puppy installer created worked fine. That I think covers everything in the root dir.

My case was simple and all the files were in the root dir which was mounted on /mnt/home/. Any other cases need to be considered. Also my original medium was Flash USB and I created another Flash USB in the same way (but of a larger size). I don't know if I'd installed to a different type of medium whether it would have worked.

Someone mentioned Grub. My install (an elderly Tahrpup) has no Grub and no other boot config file, it just has the partition's boot flag on. I don't know if I had set up Grub whether that would affect the process but guess not, assuming it's always the only removable boot device. Obviously any extra config files of any sort would probably need to be copied across.

That's as much as I know. If someone could use this as the basis (with many enlargements and corrections no doubt) for a post to a new category/sticky post or whatever, others like myself might find it useful.

[TerryH]

Well, let me stick to the topic!

Yes. I'm a beginner compared to most of you but I think this would be useful. AFAICS this relates to creating a copy of a frugal install on new media which may be of a different size. It may vary from one version to another but the files that seemed to be needed were
initrd.gz
*.sfs
Save file or directory

vmlinuz and probably any help etc *.msg files probably never change. ldlinux.sys was different but immutable, I don't know what the difference was but the new one that Puppy installer created worked fine. That I think covers everything in the root dir.

My case was simple and all the files were in the root dir which was mounted on /mnt/home/. Any other cases need to be considered. Also my original medium was Flash USB and I created another Flash USB in the same way (but of a larger size). I don't know if I'd installed to a different type of medium whether it would have worked.

Someone mentioned Grub. My install (an elderly Tahrpup) has no Grub and no other boot config file, it just has the partition's boot flag on. I don't know if I had set up Grub whether that would affect the process but guess not, assuming it's always the only removable boot device. Obviously any extra config files of any sort would probably need to be copied across.

That's as much as I know. If someone could use this as the basis (with many enlargements and corrections no doubt) for a post to a new category/sticky post or whatever, others like myself might find it useful. The simplest kernel upgrade process in Linux.

Just a clarification on what files should be copied. The vmlinuz is the kernel and should be always copied, the vmlinuz and zdrv*.sfs need to go together as the zdrv contains the kernel modules in /lib/modules for the included kernel. The installation won't run otherwise.

Also worth noting, you can do a manual kernel change by simply replacing vmlinuz and zdrv.sfs with those from a downloaded kernel which you can find in the additional software section of the forum.

[mikewalsh]

Also worth noting, you can do a manual kernel change by simply replacing vmlinuz and zdrv.sfs with those from a downloaded kernel which you can find in the additional software section of the forum.

^^^ +1.

Just remember this will work with any Pup, really, from approx Tahrpup onwards. This was when the Woof-CE build system was then fully 'on-line'.

Prior to that, things were a wee bit more involved, of course. Open the main SFS. Swap over several directories, in addition to the vmlinuz and various other files from the drive 'root'-level. Re-build the SFS, followed by re-building the ISO itself if required.

Really, Woof-CE has made life so much easier for all concerned, in so many different ways.....


Mike.

[grepnoke]

All useful, TerryH and mikewalsh

I included zdrv*.sfs as I copied over all .sfs files. I only didn't copy over vmlinuz because I'd checked that the new installed one was identical to the old one. Upgrading that and zdrv*.sfs results a kernel upgrade, that's worth knowing about, but will this always work, i.e. can there be non-backwards-compatible changes that will break installed apps? Or are these only going to be in major version changes?

I have faint memories of rebuilding sfs files when I first tried Puppy, version 5.2.0 or thereabouts. But I only tinker in case of need so I never really got to understand the principles.